XP SP3 Locks Users In To IE7

This article over at Computer World tells the tale.

If you have Windows XP and install SP3 you will be locked into IE7. You will not be able to downgrade to IE6.

Now I’m willing to bet within a few weeks of SP3’s release we’ll see instructions on how to get IE6 up and running. At the same time I don’t see this as an entirely bad thing. IE7 is certainly better than IE6 in terms of standards compliance. But I’m not a fan of locking users in like this.

I wonder, though, why you’re locked in. Is IE7 some how integral to SP3? I thought Microsoft was suppose to separate its browser from its OS. If they’re integrated again that might break certain judgements made in the EU.